


Interview with wendymarlowe

by kate_the_reader, May_Shepard, wendymarlowe



Category: Sherlock (TV), Sherlock Holmes & Related Fandoms
Genre: Author Interview, Dear John Fandom, Interviews, M/M, wendymarlowe interview
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-03-12
Updated: 2015-03-12
Packaged: 2018-03-17 14:17:46
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,177
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3532463
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/kate_the_reader/pseuds/kate_the_reader, https://archiveofourown.org/users/May_Shepard/pseuds/May_Shepard, https://archiveofourown.org/users/wendymarlowe/pseuds/wendymarlowe
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>In Fall / Winter 2014/2015, the Sherlock fandom was moved to tears and rampant comment parties by Dear John, an epistolary fic and the brainchild of wendymarlowe. What made the Dear John experience so compelling--beyond wendymarlowe's considerable finesse with crafting an ironclad conflict and writing absolutely gorgeous smut--was the fact that it updated in real time. With sometimes large gaps between updates, the Fandom Who Waited did what we do best: wait, and speculate wildly, and celebrate our collective intelligence and longing to watch these two idiots finally get something right. </p><p>wendymarlowe generously agreed to answer some questions cooked up by me (<a href="http://may-shepard.tumblr.com/">tumblr</a>), kate_the_reader (Kate2Kat on Tumblr) and sundry Dear John fans about Dear John, how she crafted the story, and her experience of watching the fandom develop.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Interview with wendymarlowe

**Author's Note:**

  * Inspired by [Dear John](https://archiveofourown.org/works/2647979) by [wendymarlowe](https://archiveofourown.org/users/wendymarlowe/pseuds/wendymarlowe). 



**How did you come up with the idea for Dear John? Was your primary impulse to post something in real time, to write epistolary fiction, or did the two go hand in hand?**

wm: Actually, my primary impulse was to not commit too much. I already had a few Sherlock fics on my plate: an omegaverse one (http://archiveofourown.org/works/2477393), a Mystrade slow-burn story (http://archiveofourown.org/works/1554926), and an ongoing series of shorts (http://archiveofourown.org/series/66368), one of which I was only halfway through. Those were all on top of my “real” writing, a M/M romance which I was only a quarter of the way through. I had this weird idea one day that I could do a back-and-forth series of letters between John and Sherlock in real time, and the format would give me a structure so I didn’t feel like it was sucking up all my writing time. I’m not sure how I stumbled across the idea of John and Sherlock meeting on a dating site - I’ve never used one - but I immediately realized it would be perfect for the story.

 

**How much of the story had you planned before you started posting?**

wm: I’m absolutely a plotter, so I actually had a pretty decent idea of the pacing before I started. My initial idea was to have John and Sherlock get to know each other, have Christmas be their first big sexual encounter, then have Sherlock disappear for a while (kidnapped) and John freak out. They’d work around that, go back and forth for a while longer, then finally arrange to meet. I wasn’t sure, back in November, exactly how I was going to make that work out, but I had a general idea of keeping the fic going for 2-3 months or so.

 

**Did you craft Dear John with the idea that it would create a serial effect for your audience, leaving us hanging while we waited for the next development?**

wm: Yes, that was definitely part of the idea from the start. I actually think I got the idea from AO3’s email alerts - how exciting it was to get updates from my favorite authors, and how much that would be like waiting for an email from an online romance. And I realized if I did the fic in “real time,” being subscribed to it would be like every follower getting to listen in on the emails and getting to experience that thrill for themselves.

 

**While it was still happening, some Tumblr commentators stated Dear John was the biggest thing to happen to the fandom since the last series of the show was released. So, thanks for that! What did you think about the way Dear John developed its own fandom? Did you enjoy the comment party?**

wm: I’m absolutely blown away, honestly. There are so many amazing works already in the Sherlock fandom, and I figured I was coming late to the party! I think it was during the Christmas hiatus that I really started to realize how truly invested in the story so many people were - before that it was just me doing my thing and occasionally getting pats on the back for it. I have my email set to copy me on every comment that gets left on my fics, so for a while there at the end I was literally able to check my email every ten minutes and get two or three new comment alerts each time. It was pretty fantastic.

 

**The Dear John fandom seemed to grow hugely in the last 10 days, when it was widely recced on Tumblr (just before the first meeting). How conscious were you of what was happening on Tumblr and Twitter?**

wm: Not at all, at first. I’ve been trying to get a romance novel published for a few years now, so I spend a lot of virtual time with writers. And in the professional writing community, there’s a pretty big ideological split over the idea of fanfiction - some authors are very much pro-fanwork, while others are bothered by the idea of someone taking their characters and making them do things they wouldn’t have done in the author’s canon. I think those of us who already write sex in our books don’t tend to mind as much :-P but I can understand both sides.

Anyway, because of that split, I’ve always kept my fanfic and my “real” writing separate because I didn’t want my fanfic to hurt my chances at publication. (Since then I’ve been surprised at how many “real” writers are also huge fanfic readers and sometimes producers - I’d say among erotic romance authors it’s about 50%.) Partway through Dear John, though, I went ahead and posted my Twitter name in the comments, figuring at this point, why not? (It's @wendyqualls, if you want to say hi!) I ultimately gained about a hundred followers as Dear John played out. I followed a few back and started getting tagged in as people talked about each update. Eventually I did occasional searches for “wendymarlowe” or “Dear John” just to see what people were saying :-)

In writing, there’s an often-repeated piece of advice saying you should never read the reviews of your book, because you could have 99 good ones and 1 bad one and that bad one will be what sticks with you. I was very aware of that as I eavesdropped on Twitter (and, more rarely, Tumblr), but I was really pleasantly surprised to see that way more than 99% of the comments were positive. Even the negative comments I saw were more along the lines of “I just can’t get into this,” which is totally fine. Fanfic readers are so polite!

 

**At what point did you realize that you had something really special? Did the size and enthusiasm of the Dear John fandom affect the way you felt about fandom, your story, or the experience of writing Dear John?**

wm: The massive amount of feedback was definitely a headrush! I figure this is what authors like J.K. Rowling felt like when their books suddenly became big successes - it’s an incredible feeling of validation to read all the comments and look at the stats and say “wow, all these people think I’m worth reading.” What felt like the biggest milestone for me (and would probably mean nothing to anyone else) was when the AO3 hits on Dear John surpassed the population of my hometown (35,000) and the kudos surpassed the number of students at my high school (1500). That was when I just sat back and said “wow, that’s a lot of people.” (I did post simultaneously on fanfiction.net too, as I do with all my works, but the comment system there is totally different and although Dear John was well-received, it didn’t turn into the community that AO3 developed.)

 

**The comments section remained positive, but as everyone got whipped into a fervor at the end, there was a lot of commentary along the lines of “wendy is a god” or things that are just insanely positive. Did you feel at any point like it was a bit too intense?**

wm: The religion-based ones did feel weird to me, because I do identify as Christian and I really don’t want to start my own ideology :-P (I mean, look what happened to the last guy!) For the most part, though, everything was all in good fun and it was all coming out of that sense of community anyway, so in that light it was fine.

 

**Similarly, there were comments like “I’m really nervous but I expect x, y, and z to happen because I know wendy is a genius.” Were you nervous about committing to an ending, knowing that some people would want exactly what you'd decided, but others wouldn't?**

wm: Absolutely - there were certainly readers who expected everything to end with sunshine and roses, but (speaking as a writer) I knew that wouldn’t be as satisfying an ending as it might seem. And I hate that the beginning of The Apology bothered so many people, but that’s the nature of publishing episodically - the first chapter had to be up a bit before second (and third and fourth) could come along and fix it.

 

**What was it like for you to read through all of the different kinds of speculation being the only one with the knowledge of what was about to transpire? What was it like seeing guesses that were right, wrong, completely out of character?**

wm: It felt like watching a movie with a bunch of friends, when I was the only one who had seen it before. Sitting there going “ooh ooh ooh, you guys, wait until you see this next part! It’s awesome! You’re going to laugh so hard!” And it was pretty neat to see how the guesses spanned the spectrum - some people saying “It has to do X because of ABC,” other people saying “I really really really want Y to happen next!”, and other people saying “But surely he wants to do Z!” Totally different rationales, but it kept everyone waiting to see if they were right!

 

**Did any of the ideas / points of speculation posted in the comments make you re-evaluate your game plan? Did the reactions of readers alter anything about the story itself or the pace at which you posted it? What were they? If you did change story elements and you care to enlighten us, could you tell us about what you chose not to include?**

wm: Not the speculation, but the reaction definitely did. Originally I had planned for the radio silence from Sherlock after Christmas to extend another full week, but watching the comments and the reactions, I felt that would have pushed the anticipation from “exciting and agonizing” to “boring.” I had also planned to end the fic right after their aborted date - all the emails back and forth leading up to meeting, then silence on the day of the meeting itself, then mark the fic as “complete” the next day. Midway through January or so I got the idea to post an email from the dating site itself as a more concrete closer, but I still planned to leave the ending ambiguous (as would make total sense, if you’re just watching the email trail). The week leading up to the date was when Dear John really caught on with new readers, though, and I think an ambiguous ending would have really disappointed everyone even if it was a solid literary choice. The apologies were kind of a compromise. And then after all THAT, I decided I really needed to write at least “The Apology,” and might as well do “The Date” and “The Hiatus” as well and just make it a set. I purposely posted the first chapter of “The Apology” concurrently with the end of “Dear John” so everyone didn’t read “the end” and freak out that it was over.

 

**Things in the comment party stayed quite light and happy during the Dear John phase, but got quite angsty when you published the first chapter of The Apology. How did that affect you, personally, and /or as a writer?**

wm: Honestly? It was kind of hard to take, especially after all the amazing love running up to the end of Dear John. *I* knew The Apology was going to resolve, but there was a ton of angst built up and with John’s trust issues and Sherlock’s fear of exposing his heart, they had to work through a lot first. I was really very proud of that first chapter, and at first I didn’t understand why so many people were saying John was abusive. It took some back-and-forth with commenters (and some back-and-forth changing the fic tags) before I really got it. And originally I was planning to have John and Sherlock not quite connecting for another chapter or so (i.e. they’re pushing toward sex but Sherlock thinks John is using it as a punishment and John thinks Sherlock is bluffing about actually having a heart) - but given the feedback on the first chapter, I felt it was important to clear that up sooner rather than later.

 

**When Dear John ended, your readers were certainly exhausted. How did you deal with winding up the story? Any reverb on your end?**

wm: It was weird having the constant comment alert emails die down, for sure - I was getting used to the attention :-) And I’m kicking myself that I’m still in the early stages of my writing career, because it would have been the perfect time to say “here, I’ve got this original M/M book out, if you want to see more from me.” I definitely think that by doing The Apology/The Date/The Hiatus, I’m seeing that energy wind down naturally instead of just breaking off.

 

**What role do you think the long hiatuses between series play in the fandom? We could argue that phenomena like Dear John happen largely because hiatus gives us such an ample stretch of time in which to play. Are the the hiatuses a good thing for us?**

wm: I think _Sherlock_ is a unique sandbox to play in, and that’s part of why I’m still here :-) You’ve got these BRILLIANTLY written characters, with all these different facets of not just their own personalities, but the way they interact with each other. And then you’ve got creators who have publicly stood up and said they support fan-made works, they love for people to interact with the story like that, and they’re all for it. I think Sherlock would be a terrible person to actually deal with in real life, but he’s a fascinating character to write.

Which is a long way to say - I do think the hiatus in Sherlock gave us a unique opportunity. In most other fandoms, even if there’s implied time between episodes or seasons, the characters aren’t actually *doing* anything. Buffy the Vampire Slayer takes the summer off at the end of the season and starts school the next year and school is the same, Buffy is the same, her friends are the same (plus or minus some new cast members), etc. It’s implied that off-camera time is of no importance. I think the Reichenbach fall hiatus was so much more because it’s obvious that everyone came back changed - there was no need to explore “how” or “why” in the next episode, because it was all implied. And it means we fanfic writers can step in and create our own details.

 

**Would you try a real time story again, and what advice might you have for other writers tempted to try something similar?**

wm: I would - the format worked very well for me, in the “not too much of a commitment” sense as well as the “being well-received” sense. Unfortunately, I also feel like this particular setup was a one-off - the whole premise of Dear John wouldn’t have worked anywhere near as well if the show hadn’t set up this hugely emotional rift and then given us a whole two years to play in it. If I did do another real time story, it would have to be something where the “real time” element actually added to the creation rather than just being a side element, and I don’t know what other setting that could possibly be.

As for advice . . . maybe just some observations?

  1. I actually had a lot of fun planning out the “hows” and “whens” of Sherlock and John’s communications. There were a few fixed points (I wanted Christmas/Boxing Day to be the first big turning point, and I specifically planned their reunion date on a day I’d be out of town and thus unable to post anyway) but in between there was a lot of leeway for “how long would he wait to reply?” versus my real-life commitments. I actually had “post chat” written on my wall calendar for Christmas afternoon because I wanted it to be exact!
  2. In a similar vein, I did actually time my posts :-) John’s always came from London time at a point I could say he was at his computer (before work, after work, late at night when he couldn’t sleep), and the tone of his posts matched the time I put them up. His rambling, angsty letters were middle-of-the-night crises, while his shorter, more thought-out ones were before or after work. I did the same for Sherlock, although I also planned out where in the world he was (America/Brazil/Syria/etc.) as we went. Probably not necessary, but I liked seeing how the responses changed between the posts that went up in the middle of the night (US time) versus the ones in the afternoon when everyone saw the email right away.
  3. It was interesting to create a balance between serious revelations and just random chatter back and forth. I purposely started with some lighter stuff at the beginning, but worked up to heavier (and more personal) admissions after Sherlock and John had their Christmas episode. The further I got in the fic, the more I had to re-read each time to make sure I wasn’t contradicting something I’d said before and then forgotten about.
  4. It was both really fun and really exhausting to fit in all the hidden meanings which would ramp up the tension and the angst. Things like the tea - Sherlock admits he misses it for nostalgic reasons, John admits he used to drink it but now has a full box and won’t touch it anymore. Obvious to the reader that they used to drink it together and now it brings back painful memories for John and wistful ones for Sherlock, but neither character catches the reference so it just goes quietly by. In particular, it was hard to hit the balance between “Sherlock always telling the (literal) truth” versus “John’s a total idiot for not realizing this is actually Sherlock.”
  5. Okay this one’s real advice: if you’re going to try a back-and-forth like this, you actually have less space to blather than you think you do. Meandering, random discussion makes for a fluffy-but-forgettable fic. Again, speaking as a dedicated plotter, but I think it’s a good idea to work out what your pacing is going to be, figure out what things HAVE to be included in the back-and-forth, and then fill in the extra spaces from there. When you’re doing a “real time” fic, every update needs to fit a dual purpose: it needs to advance the story a specified amount, and it also needs to answer the question “Why now? Why THIS day at THIS time with THIS update?”



In conclusion: I absolutely love that Dear John has generated this much community, discussion, and interaction. I love that y’all have invited me to answer interview questions - it makes me feel like a real author :-) I feel like I need to go seek out a convention and volunteer to be an expert speaker on a Sherlock fanfiction panel now :-P


End file.
